Scouts = dead end units?

L

Lord Kid

Warlord
Joined
Sep 12, 2006
Messages
191
Without a doubt, scouts are really powerful in the early game, but by the medieval era they are fairly useless, imo. Unless you get a goody hut that upgrades them to archers, they are a dead end and ultimately waste money on maintenance, which is why I try to pop all huts with them just to try to get them upgraded. I wish there was an upgrade path for them, especially when I get one leveled up through defending against barbarians. I really hate deleting a leveled scout when there is nothing further to explore. Perhaps if they had an upgrade path to something like a mobile radar or scout helicopter they wouldn't be so bad.

What do you guys think?
 
If there's nothing left to explore then why do you want a mobile scout?
 
Lord Kid said:
Without a doubt, scouts are really powerful in the early game, but by the medieval era they are fairly useless, imo. Unless you get a goody hut that upgrades them to archers, they are a dead end and ultimately waste money on maintenance, which is why I try to pop all huts with them just to try to get them upgraded. I wish there was an upgrade path for them, especially when I get one leveled up through defending against barbarians. I really hate deleting a leveled scout when there is nothing further to explore. Perhaps if they had an upgrade path to something like a mobile radar or scout helicopter they wouldn't be so bad.

What do you guys think?
Click to expand...

If you get them promoted the visibility promotions are always valuable, and become more so later in the game as you get units that can fire further than they can see, and eventually aircraft. This is however better with mounted units later in the game if you take the same promotions with them. I agree, though, that there should be scout upgrades that increase their mobility and survivability - it's just odd relying on knights as your main scouts in the medieval period...
 
It's always amusing to kick out a few scouts with a barracks/armoury right before finishing Scientific Theory (better with the americans).

Hyper sighted units that can follow your siege units around giving them full range abilities can be silly.
 
Because you can't scout everything at the beginning. For example, if you play Continents and there is no coast-tile connection between them. Or maybe you just want to upgrade your 2 Scouts from the beginning.
 
Putmalk said:
If there's nothing left to explore then why do you want a mobile scout?
Click to expand...

Mainly for keeping an eye on rival civs. Having a mobile radar unit with a better movement and defense rating on the edges of your territory could be the difference between getting annihilated by a sneak attack and being able to swing troops over to defend. As it is, you can use them in the mid-late game for this purpose, assuming they've garnered sight upgrades, but being limited to 2 hexes of movement and abysmal defense at that point means they are a one shot use.

Also, IRL we have scout helicopters that can see into enemy territory, then take control of say an Apaches weapons who is far away and fire their missiles at the target. Another approach would be upgrading them to UAV's for recon. Maybe if they upgraded to Predators and were able to enter another civs borders with a % chance of not being discovered and not declaring war to see what they are up to would be good.
 
The best bet would be to give a sight boost to helicopter gunship and allow us to build radar towers in our cities that grant 4 sight in the city. That might be pretty useful.

Scouts could upgrade to Pikeman which eventually upgrades into the Anti-Tank line.
 
Scout can also be useful for the garrison bonus from the honor tree, because they're a cheap unit. So you can keep your combat units on the front lines had pump out a bunch of scouts quickly to fill in the garrison slots. Sure, a ranged unit is better in that role, but scout work great even if they're only there temporarily.
 
Monthar said:
Scout can also be useful for the garrison bonus from the honor tree, because they're a cheap unit. So you can keep your combat units on the front lines had pump out a bunch of scouts quickly to fill in the garrison slots. Sure, a ranged unit is better in that role, but scout work great even if they're only there temporarily.
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Yep. I do that a lot, with my expansionist empires. You get good benefits from multiple social policies, for keeping a garrison active- and I hate having to use first line combat units to do it with. Also, when you have to pull those units to go fight a war, your gold/happiness per turn takes a steep dive :sad:

Sometimes I forget to do that before you can no longer build scouts, and then I am a sad panda.
 
MadDjinn said:
It's always amusing to kick out a few scouts with a barracks/armoury right before finishing Scientific Theory (better with the americans).

Hyper sighted units that can follow your siege units around giving them full range abilities can be silly.
Click to expand...

MadDjinn, quit trolling my life by pointing out obvious things I will never figure out on my own.;)
 
I would like to see a scout upgrades to an explorer with a larger strenght/defence in the late medival/early renaisance. It might be usefull to explore new continents or islands wich are crowded with barbs. A scout would be killed in no-time, while a stronger explorer can hold it a little longer.
When in the industrial era, explorers become less usefull. They could be upgraded to riflemen or lancer, the no terrain cost and extra sight bonus becomes handy for those units.
 
Remmert said:
I would like to see a scout upgrades to an explorer with a larger strenght/defence in the late medival/early renaisance. It might be usefull to explore new continents or islands wich are crowded with barbs. A scout would be killed in no-time, while a stronger explorer can hold it a little longer.
When in the industrial era, explorers become less usefull. They could be upgraded to riflemen or lancer, the no terrain cost and extra sight bonus becomes handy for those units.
Click to expand...

If you're really lucky, you can get your scouts upgraded to Mech Inf, but that requires a goody hut to pop in your favor. And if you're China or England, you get some powerhouse machine guns, again if you're very lucky.

However, as a recon type unit, I don't feel scouts should ultimately end up this way. Maybe scouts->explorers with the capability of setting up a trading post in another civs or unoccupied territory, perhaps to link an unclaimed resource. It would have to be settled on the resource, and have no defense against attack unless you station a unit there, but it would allow gaining access to resources without the need to settle a full blown city there, much like the Crawler from SMAC.
 
Lord Kid said:
If you're really lucky, you can get your scouts upgraded to Mech Inf, but that requires a goody hut to pop in your favor. And if you're China or England, you get some powerhouse machine guns, again if you're very lucky.

However, as a recon type unit, I don't feel scouts should ultimately end up this way. Maybe scouts->explorers with the capability of setting up a trading post in another civs or unoccupied territory, perhaps to link an unclaimed resource. It would have to be settled on the resource, and have no defense against attack unless you station a unit there, but it would allow gaining access to resources without the need to settle a full blown city there, much like the Crawler from SMAC.
Click to expand...

Or the resource colony from CIII.
 
I'd just be happy if there was an amphibious kind of recon unit that could cross oceans safely and explore new continents. My scouts always wander into barbarian units on random islands when I explore oceans with them. A Scout riding inside of a Caravel would be great! Or something analogous to that, anyway.
 
Kwami said:
I'd just be happy if there was an amphibious kind of recon unit that could cross oceans safely and explore new continents. My scouts always wander into barbarian units on random islands when I explore oceans with them. A Scout riding inside of a Caravel would be great! Or something analogous to that, anyway.
Click to expand...

Would love to see scouts be embarkable on any naval vessel, and admirals able to embark on same.
 
Smokeybear said:
Would love to see scouts be embarkable on any naval vessel, and admirals able to embark on same.
Click to expand...

I'm good with both of these ideas.

And I think that scouts should have an upgrade path once you're not allowed to build them anymore. Maybe let them start out as a pikeman.

I also like the garrison idea, I do this all the time for cities that have almost no chance of being attacked.
 
I got the 'lose the Korea scenario as Korea on deity' achievement* by tactical use of throwing scouts by the dozen to be chewed up by Japanese...

* you're allied with China which would otherwise auto-win on points!:crazyeye:
 
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